'It’s fine for builders to keep calm and carry on but not Parliament' - MP criticises early recess

Hove MP Peter Kyle says Parliament's early recess 'feels wrong'

AN MP has said Parliament’s early recess “feels wrong” amid the coronavirus crisis.

It was announced yesterday that Parliament would shut down a week early to prevent any further spreading of the virus.

The Commons was due to go into recess next Tuesday, March 31, for three weeks, but MPs were sent back to their constituencies last night because the Government wants to protect staff.

Labour supported the early shutdown but some peers and MPs expressed fears that ministers could avoid scrutiny about how they are dealing with the crisis.

On Twitter, Hove MP Peter Kyle said: “I feel very anxious about this early recess. The Government say it’s fine for builders to keep calm and carry on but not Parliament – it just feels wrong to me.”

MPs and peers are not due to return to Parliament until Tuesday, April 21.

Earlier this week Mr Kyle said he had been “relentlessly” feeding back to ministers about the need for more testing, as well as more protective equipment for NHS workers and financial help for the self-employed.

He said: “We’re simply not testing enough people and without the detailed knowledge of exactly who has the virus, the job of targeting resources effectively becomes really difficult.

“To illustrate how far we need to go to get on top on this, think about the scale of testing in South Korea: in total since this crisis began, Britain has tested about 70,000 people for the virus and we have been constrained by our ability to procure tests.

Mr Kyle said he had heard in “harrowing detail” from frontline NHS workers and carers in Hove about a lack of suitable protective equipment in hospitals and care homes, and that he was working “flat out” to get the Government to provide the right resources without further delay.

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